FilmDrunk Suggests:Stalingrad looks phenomenal, while Odd Thomas looks like it could have campy potential. Meanwhile, Non-Stop is… a movie, apparently.

"Did I remember to turn the stove and vibrator off?"

Non-Stop

Rotten Tomatoes Scores: 57% critics, 73% audience

Gratuitous Review Quotes:

Why demand logic of an action movie released in February, when audiences just want a nice, bumpy ride? – Richard Corliss, TIME magazine

Neeson is such an eloquent hunk of Irish melancholy that he gives everything he does – snapping a neck or taking a drink of water – a classical gravitas. – David Edelstein, Vulture

Armchair Analysis: As much as I have enjoyed the mindless stupidity of the Taken movies, I watch the commercials and trailers for Non-Stop and wonder if Liam Neeson and Ralph Fiennes made a pact during Clash and Wrath of the Titans to “just have fun” with the rest of their careers and not try so hard anymore. So Neeson signed on for Non-Stop, Taken 3 and the Entourage movie while Fiennes was like, “LOL sucker.”

"Heyyyy, everybody chillax! J-Chrizzle's in the hizzouse."

Son of God

Rotten Tomatoes Scores: 21% critics, 83% audience

Gratuitous Review Quotes:

This is more a pageant than a story about characters and their motivations; it’s as brusque in its storytelling as an illustrated children’s bible, which would at least offer some mystery and grandeur in the composition of its images. – Alan Scherstuhl, Village Voice

By playing it so safely reverential, Son of God tends to plod its way to Calvary, begging to be discussed among Bible study groups and positively name-checked in the Sunday sermons. – Geoff Pevere, Globe and Mail

Armchair Analysis: Thank goodness, a movie about Jesus. I was worried that an entire generation would miss out on his story for a month. Sorry, I don’t mean to sound blasphemous. I just think it’s time that Peter got his own movie. That guy would have some HILARIOUS misadventures.

Russia has the most depressing dodgeball games.

Stalingrad

Rotten Tomatoes Scores: 47% critics, 44% audience

Gratuitous Review Quotes:

Overall, Stalingrad is a bizarre concoction, part Putin-era patriotic chest-thumping and part creaky war melodrama, all set in a superbly recreated ruined city. – Liam Lacey, Globe and Mail

To wave a flag, sing a song and celebrate it as the uncomplicated and inevitable victory of good over evil is the sort of easy message only an old propagandist – or a president for life – could really cheer. – Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger

Armchair Analysis: Well, I thought this movie looked phenomenal. Apparently the trailer included all of the best parts, because those reviews are whatever the Russian word for bad is.

What's in the bag? I hope it's a KFC Bowl!

Odd Thomas

Rotten Tomatoes Scores: 30% critics, 64% audience

Gratuitous Review Quotes:

An endearing, witty romantic dramedy-slash-supernatural-thriller about a small desert town in California beset by demonic apparitions and a satanic cabal of deranged would-be mass murderers. – Tirdad Derakhshani, Philadelphia Inquirer

This expensive-looking indie, adapted from a supernatural book series by sci-fi author Dean Koontz, tries too hard for a wacky tone, and winds up merely brain-dead. – Joe Neumaier, New York Daily News

Armchair Analysis: I just want this movie to be good. I’m bored with the run of crap movies that have opened 2014, with The LEGO Movie as the most obvious exception. And a few others. Whatever. I just want to like this movie, because I watched Vampire Academy this week and my brain is depressed.

So Neeson signed on for Non-Stop, Taken 3 and the Entourage movie while Fiennes was like, “LOL sucker.”

Hold up, what?

/runs Google search
//sees that Neeson shot scenes with Jeremy Piven for Entourage movie this week
///gets to more important news that Neeson signed on for Taken 3, which shoots this spring

That’s some significant Liam Neeson news that somehow didn’t get its own post on Filmdrunk, which I would have never expected. Also, apparently no one gets taken in Taken 3. How has this not been a bigger story?!?

It might be gone now, but the full Stalingrad was up on the You of Tubes as of this Wednesday. Oh, sure, it’s in Russian with no sub-titles, but who among us doesn’t at least have a working knowledge of Russian?

Stalingrad was decent… The first 1/3 was more concerned with visuals than “story”…. But once it committed to its theme (mythical fantasty WII) it’s was at least somewhat enjoyable. And certainly worth seeing on IMAX 3D. The small screen does not do it justice.

It’s almost worth watching the movie just to see Julianne Moore looking so fine, but I must resist her wiles. I am very worried about her vibrator, though.

It also sounds like lots of Christian big-shots are buying up millions of dollars in tickets for the Jesus movie, to make sure it has a big opening weekend. Much better than wasting the money on helping the poor.

Hey, you gotta spend money to make money, baby. And then with THAT money, you build some budget housing. And then you use that as a shooting location for your next film about the end of days. And while that neighborhood burns in the fires of the apocalypse, who’s standing by, basking in all that nice warmth? The homeless! BAM, good deed done!